


Battles Along the Ho-Ho

by Zoya1416



Series: THE PATRICIAN'S BABY [4]
Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: age-appropriate fighting, children/parenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-14
Updated: 2014-05-14
Packaged: 2018-01-24 16:22:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1611599
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zoya1416/pseuds/Zoya1416
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Robbie Vetinari is five; Sammie Ramkin-Vimes is six. They are now part of a gang, err, the Patrician's Playdates.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Battles Along the Ho-Ho

**Author's Note:**

> Sammie and all Discworld is Pratchett's. The other children are mine.

The two teams readied themselves at each end of the garden. The golems gave a countdown—Three, Two, One, Initiate Play

Various missiles flew in the air, and various implements batted them back. Young Sam (Sammie to everyone except his father) lead off with the traditional but effective mud clods.

Robbie Vetinari returned them with a wide batted hockey stick. Mr. Boggis's sons pitched balls, both heavy and light, which hit the ground in front of the other team and then bounced up with force. These were harder to defend against, since the bounces could not be predicted, but various implements, including a netted stick, popped them back hard.

The Klatchian diplomat's daughter, Sorina, spun a new kind of weapon today, a flat, circular, soft metal baking dish which flew in wide curves. She was aided by Robbie's traitorous bichon frise, which caught the dish and returned it to her for treats.

The twin granddaughters of one of the new aristocrats of the city, Lord Harry King, had been prevented from soaking their rag missiles in one of their father's yellow products, but had countered with old fish paste. Ankla and Durban Downey had been shaken down for all knives, but produced very prickly plants instead.

Grag Bashfullsson's sons, or possibly daughters, could not throw their usual rocks, but had put their heads together and created very thin, lightly sewn together cloth objects filled with water which burst upon contact with the other side. Since they'd gotten water out of the Ankh, these objects were quite foul. They bunted balls with their axes, or chopped them up.

And, dainty but fierce, Moist von Lipwig-Dearheart's daughter had sneaked behind the opposition and pounded the unsuspecting with rotten apples. This was borderline cheating, and she had been reproved for it.

Two of the Palace clerks had been tasked with keeping the play from getting too dangerous, a thankless job, as they had been pelted by both sides. After several games they had been prepared with leather coveralls loaned from Sibyl's dragon pens, improving their defenses and satisfaction immensely. The clerks also kept a running census on the combatants—twelve children could be quite hard to keep track of. They'd spotted the Lipwig girl, but let her get on with it.

Lord Vetinari sat working in the garden of the Palace, only half listening to the shrieks. In the five years since Robbie had arrived unannounced to his gates, he'd developed a great deal of tolerance to noise and disorder, allowing this little mite (now fifty pounds and tall for his age) to take him over. He would not have believed he could bend so much. This little group, and various permutations, played together twice a week, once at the Palace and once at the Ramkin-Vimes.

The stern and foreboding Patrican had a native guide to parenting in Sibyl Ramkin. Robbie was a year younger than Sammie, so Sibyl and Sam had already passed through the fire of each stage of development. At five and six each child was now strong and healthy, talking fluently, toilet-trained, and reading. 

They were also little terrors, fighting while exploring all through the Palace, finding the secret passages, and the (now empty) scorpion pit. He'd had to get rid of the scorpions because the boys threatened them so much. It would have relieved his feelings greatly to toss them in there for even just a few minutes, but he'd reluctantly decided against it.

He could now ignore cries and yells, attuned only to those of real pain. It amused him that he had accepted a level of chaos previously unthinkable.

A mud clod landed next to his chair and he jumped. Then another one, and he looked up at the culprits.

“Robbie! Sammie! You stop that this minute! The game's over!”

He'd never yelled before as an adult, never raised a hand to anyone except to inhume them, and old habits had been strong. 

The Palace Gardens had been devised by B.S. Johnson, and the boys delighted in exploring it. He'd worked on making it harmless. He filled in the fifty-foot deep hoho, leaving it at a depth of four feet, and imported sand to cover its mud. He'd had no idea that the fountain with the exploding cherub still had another activating dolphin sculpture. Fortunately, the Borogravian delegation had strong hearts. Confining the boys to their rooms had proved poorly effective in the past, and so, because of this dangerous behavior, he'd birched Robbie. He felt better for a bit, but this also seemed ineffective.

The Garden had once had a trout pond, one inch wide and fifty feet long, which had lost its single trout when the boys pestered it. The trout had gone to a special heaven for fish, he'd solemnly sworn. He'd widened the pond without deepening it.

The teams were now all splashing around the pond, comparing scores.

“We won, Sammie! Lacy von Lipwig scored on you with the apples.”

“She cheated! And we won because of Glod and Raffy with the water balls!”

Wet mud and dunkings broke out, but briefly, because they smelled the food.

Lord Vetinari's staff had prepared refreshments for the children, lemon squash and biscuits, and, he shuddered, the bacon sandwiches beloved by Sam Vimes. They were indigestible, but did smell wonderful. 

John and Dane, Boggis' boys, were still tossing stolen (of course) missiles at Harrietta and Blondie King. (No one was still calling her Belinda.) These were desultory tosses, preliminaries to the real pre-adolescent fighting.

Robbie and Sammie had retired to the hoho, but their voices carried.

“Mine! My Dad is the worst!”

“No, mine!”

“Mine has handcuffs! And the jail!” 

“Poo! Mine has the pit!”

“It's empty now, you loony!”

“But he did have it, and that counts!”

“No arrrghaaa,”

“Aiiiaaaggh.”

Blows came heavy now, and there was real painful screaming.

He threw down his pen in disgust, struggling to rein in his temper. He had never loved anyone except his aunt, and her annoyances vanished compared to Robbie's. He loved his son with the passion of a true convert to parental affection.The daily rowdiness was wearying him, though. It almost made him wish the child's mother had come back to help out, but demonstrably, the woman had fewer parenting instincts than a fish.

“Boys. What's all this about, then?”

Sammie perked up. “Oh, that's what the Watch says, Lord Vetinari!”

“I do not care a figgin what the Watch says." (He'd even inadvertently used street language on occasion, but did not give a figgin about it). "What are you two on about this time?”

Robbie raised his head, which showed a new bruise on his cheek.

“We was--”

“Were.”

“We were fighting about whose Dad was the worst—the scariest. And you are. You make people nervous all the time.” Robbie rewarded his very scary father with an adoring look.

Sammie jumped in. “No, my Dad is. If he glares at somebody they tell him everything!”

They each landed another blow.

“Get out of there this instant! It doesn't matter whose Dad is the worst! Go say goodbye to your guests, Robbie. Sammie, stay here with me.”

Without Robbie beside him, Sammie was quiet and a bit nervous himself. His Dad was the toughest, no doubt, but he secretly agreed that Lord Vetinari was the scariest.

When Sammie looked up at Vetinari the man saw the convergence of Sam and Sybil's features, brown eyes like Sam, but with lighter brown hair like Sibyl's. Genetics was an amazing thing. Robbie did not resemble him much, being a far more attractive child than he had been, blond hair and taller than other children his age. The Tallthorpe's were a handsome family. Robbie's eyebrows and eyes were his, as was the beginning of a pint-sized glare. He'd had to cover a smile the first time Robbie had tried to outstare him. 

“Sammie, as you know, you're a year older than Robbie. Even though he's as tall as you, and weighs more, you're older and should be more mature.” Here Vetinari gave his patented frown. “I don't what you to fight with him so much. I do not like it when you get hurt. It makes me think I shouldn't let you be together as often.” The arched eyebrows elicited compliance where yelling never could.

“Yes, Lord Vetinari, I won't fight so much. And I'll tell him that you're the scariest Dad anyone could have, ever.” 

“Yes, well, get on home, then. Your golem is waiting for you.”

After all the boys and girls had left, and Robbie went with him back to their apartments, he said to Robbie, “You won. Sammie said that I am scarier than his Dad.”

“Oh, you're the best and scariest Dad ever. I wuv you so much!”

“Love. And I love you too. Please don't fight so much with Sammie. It makes his mother and father angry. (Please! He had said please to a child!) And you know what? Sammie's mother is even scarier than me OR his father.”

“Oooh, yes, she is scary with all those dragons. Can I go visit them tomorrow?”

“No. I'm not happy that you and Sammie hurt each other. But you may go with the gang the day after tomorrow.” No one was calling it the Patrician's Playdate anymore.

They are close to a real gang, he mused, even as the members came and went. The Palace Pals. The Patrician's Brigade. Lady Sybil's Roaring Lads and Ladettes? The Them? He'd formed them like the rest of his political alliances, with an eye to combining various factions. It was now a privilege to be thrown in the mud by the Patrician's boy. Or certainly, throw him. They served him, and therefore Ankh-Morpork, just by existing. Who knew? In the future a King might marry a von Lipwig, or even a Downey.

At the thought of Lord Downey marrying his son to Harrietta King, Lord Vetinari laughed to himself.The gang needed something to quiet them down, though. Maybe building a dirt fort? Were tree houses suitable for this age? He didn't even know what other kinds of play equipment was available. He'd never played much as a child--small, scrawny, a reader, adept at sneaking and hiding, with no children his age. He would learn. He thought of how the Assassins' Guild encouraged its students to learn chess, as a means to aiding thought. They should have all been put in charge of a child—then they'd learn the true meaning of thinking several steps ahead and sidewise.

“Will you read 'Where's My Cow' tonight, Dad?” a piping voice called.

“How about something scary? The Very Hungry Spider, maybe?”

“Or the Beastie Bears visit the Dungeon?”

“Ah, no dungeons. Spiders it is. And I think there are Fiery Ants, too. Maybe even Rats of Unusual Size?”

He received a tight hip-high hug, and returned it.


End file.
